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On 10th May 1999,
Comrade Nirmal (alias Prakash), a state committee member of CPI (ML) [People’s
War], Bihar was martyred in Upper Dumri village of Gumla district of Bihar in an
encounter with the police. Another young and energetic comrade, Hareram Patel
originally from Bilaspur, Madhya Pradesh was also martyred along with Comrade
Nirmal. Hareram Patel had joined the squad two months back. The encounter took
place when the police of Gumla and Ranchi PS, sent at the behest of Birla who
owns bauxite mines in the region, who had been chasing the squad of CPI (ML)
[People’s War] managed to block all the escape routes from this village in the
early hours of 10th morning and subsequently surrounded the village and began
firing indiscriminately. There was no option other than to accept martyrdom for
Com. Nirmal and Com. Hareram Patel. Three squad members were arrested as well.
Com. Nirmal
Nirmal or Prakash as
he was popularly known in Bihar comes from a middle class business family of
Shahadra area in Delhi. His actual name was Sunil. Small built, bespectacled,
31-year old Sunil with an infectious energy, wide grin and loud laugh was an
extremely bright student. He completed B.Com Hons. from Shyamlal College of
Delhi University and achieved 6th position in the university. He had just
completed LLB, when inspired by the revolutionary peasant movement of Bihar
being led by the CPI (ML) (PU), he shifted to Bihar in 1992. His affiliation
with CPI (ML) (PU) started in Delhi itself in 1989. Even prior to that, Sunil
along with a small group of friends in Shahadra had formed and was active in an
organisation called ‘Shoshan Virudh Prachar Samiti (Shovipras)’. With a
pro-people idealist outlook, this organisation propagated Bhagat Singh’s
ideology amongst the students and youth of the lower middle class colonies of
Shahadra, Delhi. As part of this organisation Sunil had also started going to
some villages in Meerut district of Uttar Pradesh.
In 1989, when members
of ‘Shovipras’ came in contact with CPI (ML) (PU), the main leader resisted
affiliating with the Party. However, defying him, it was under Sunil’s
leadership that the batch of activists of ‘Shovipras’ decided to affiliate
themselves with the Party and to work under its discipline. There after Sunil
became the founder member of the youth organisation, Bharat Naujawan Sangh (BNS)
which was formed in Delhi in 1989. And with this began Sunil’s short but
consistent journey towards achieving the goal of Indian revolution and the
idealist outlook gradually matured into a Marxist understanding of society and
history. Sunil also became a member of the leading committee of CPI (ML)(PU) in
Delhi. Subsequently he played an extremely important role in establishing the
work of PU in Delhi and especially in firmly establishing BNS as a militant
organisation in the trans-Yamuna area of Delhi. After participating in a village
campaign in the drought stricken areas of Bihar, very soon Sunil decided to
commit himself even more directly for the revolutionary peasant movement of
Bihar and was transferred from Delhi in 1992.
Sunil was also an
ordinary person with ordinary feelings, fears, doubts, desires, weaknesses,
uncertainties. But what was extraordinary was that Sunil had decided not to
accept a humdrum existence. What was extraordinary was his determination and
boundless energy and his concern for the oppressed masses. Sunil was a person in
whom ‘consciousness determines the being’ was personified. At every step, he
fought against himself and changed himself to be able to contribute more and
more to the just struggle of the toiling people so as they can live a life of
dignity. Once he understood the course of history; understood that those unnamed
masses who have been carrying the society on their shoulders for years upon
years, ought to be the actual rulers of this society; Sunil developed himself in
every possible way to be able to be part of the struggle for a new society. The
small-built boy whose friends were amused at his lack of ‘athletic skills’
consciously developed himself and went ahead to assume the leadership of
military affairs of the armed peasant movement of Bihar.
Sunil also like most
people was not born without fear. But he fought his fears at every step and
starting from the position of a political commissar of a squad in Koel-Kaimur
region of Bihar, went on to lead most of the daring military actions against
feudal reactionaries and the Bihar police. And he was always at the forefront —
he was a leader in an actual, practical sense. As a consequence, his name had
become a terror for the reactionaries and the police of the region.
Sunil or Nirmal
played a very important role in developing the armed peasant movement in Bihar
especially in the Koel-Kaimur region. When he came to work in this region of
Bihar, the organisational situation there was extremely grave with most of the
leading activists being arrested. Nirmal not only stayed on in these difficult
circumstances but also helped to stabilise the situation to a large extent. His
contribution was particularly evident in building the movement in Garwah
district. From 1995 onwards, he worked as a state committee member of the CPI
(ML) (PU). He participated in a military training camp in 1994 and developed
himself as a military instructor and played a leading role in subsequent
training camps. He was already part of the Bihar state level sub-committee on
military affairs and after the merger of CPI (ML) (PU) and CPI (ML) (PW) in
August 1998, he became a member of the central level sub-committee of military
affairs (SCOMA). He was also a member of the editorial board of the military
affairs magazine, ‘Jung’, and a few weeks prior to his death, he was busy with
bringing out an issue of this magazine.
The weight of
organisational responsibilities or the problems of the movement did not ever
make Comrade Nirmal brusque or bureaucratic. With his unflinching loyalty to the
masses and the Party and deep conviction in the revolutionary cause, he was
concerned with newer and newer ways of developing the organisation further.
Disciplined, energetic and intelligent, Nirmal was also extremely popular both
among the cadres and the people. He wasn’t merely a leader but also a friend to
most of the cadres. He was also very alive to the situation and conditions of
the people. He understood the patriarchal chains that the feudal society of
Bihar subjects women to and consciously tried to make space for women activists
in his area. Com. Nirmal was also very forthright about whatever he considered
to be correct and fought against various weaknesses within the organisation.
It is difficult to
imagine the armed revolutionary peasant movement of Bihar without Comrade Nirmal.
The sudden martyrdom of Com. Nirmal has left a vacuum which cannot easily be
filled. It is a great loss to the revolutionary movement not only in Bihar but
in the entire country. But the movement must go on.... and history shall avenge
the murder of Com. Nirmal and countless others who have given up their lives for
building a new society, free of exploitation, free of oppression, where those
who sweat shall live without fear and with dignity and self-respect and become
the masters of their own destiny.
People’s March
pays its red homage to these proud sons of the Indian working class who had
laid down their lives for the cause of the ongoing New Democratic Revolution and
for a Communist Society.
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